London Steam

Part 1: The Shadows of Kenfig-5

“If there is a God,” Maitland said, “I believe He looks after fools and innocents in equal degree. For certainly, had there not been something looking out for me…” He shook his head. “I was here, when the change first occurred. I didn’t know what to expect. I didn’t even know I was going to change. How could I have? No one ever talks about what happens. There are no books, no papers. It’s a sin, I know it must be, but it is a dark and hidden sin. One that even the church fears. As if knowing about a thing makes it more likely to happen.”

“Why did you come out here?” Dex said. He gestured toward the Maitland’s country estate, a small hunting lodge, really, decorated in all that was overly masculine and grotesque. Dex never could understand the need some men seemed to have to go out and shoot guns at harmless creatures. Bears, maybe. Wolves, certainly. But deer? Rabbits? Foxes. Ridiculous. And yet the hunting lodge was covered with such trophies, stuffed and displayed in all their glory.

“I was feeling restless.” Maitland shrugged. “I’m beginning to discover that that’s normal. In the week before the full moon, I get angry. My limbs don’t wish to be still. I can barely sleep. I’m no fit company for anyone. I dream of running, violence, blood. I thought perhaps a little hunting would help. My father was delighted. I’d never requested permission to come here before. Whether I was hunting game or a woman, I don’t think he would have cared. I was acting normal, as far as he was concerned. He gave me leave with almost ridiculous haste.

“When I woke, the first morning…I would love to tell you I have no memory of my time as gwr. I wish I didn’t. Isn’t that what they say, in the stories? That men don’t remember? That the wolf takes over and the man is submerged beneath the mind of a beast? I have news for you, Doctor. That’s a lie.” The young lord’s eyes shifted from clear, blameless blue to rich sea moss green. “We remember. I remember.”

Dex shivered, heat and cold warring in his spine. The young lord’s fear, his distress, tugged at Dex’s sympathies. Monster Seth might be, but also, somehow, very human. Seth’s hands curled into fists, the clean white nails biting into his hands. From across the table, Dex was aware that Seth was shuddering in an almost primal terror. Or was it terror? Perhaps it was something else entirely. Longing? Need? Desire.

“I didn’t hurt anyone. I don’t even believe that I was seen,” Seth continued, prying his fingers open. Sweat glistened along the column of his throat. “A flock of prized geese—I didn’t kill all of them, but the herder claims they are ruined, utterly terrified. He’s one of my father’s tenants, so the man brought the news to me. I reimbursed him, of course. What else was there to do? And promised that I’d keep a weather-eye out for the beast.

“It’s a bloody miracle that I wasn’t found out then.” Seth shook his head, dark hair curling around his face. “I was in a panic. Who wouldn’t be? To know, deep down, that had I come across the herder in the night, he would have been dead and the geese left alone?”

“Would you, really?” Dex asked, his voice low-pitched, gentle. “Would you have slaughtered him?”

“I don’t know.” Seth stared out the window, eyes haunted, jaw clenched. “I—my temper is not good. It was never particularly good. I wasn’t an amiable child; ask my sister. She always knew me. And these last six months, I’ve wanted to kill, wanted to gorge and run and slaughter ‘til the streets ran red. Who knows what good a single gwr could do on the streets of London? So many there who deserve death. So many.”

“I am, so they say, the foremost expert on the gwren,” Dex pointed out. “What I know is this; what the man will not do, the beast will likewise reject. You were hungry; of course you were. The change takes such a great deal of energy, to break down and reshape so much tissue and bone and sinew in that time. But would you kill a man? Devour him?”

Seth didn’t answer.